Parisdreamtime – A European's Artist Life in the "City of Lights"

"There is no shortcut" - colorstudy on Hahnemühle Fine Art Watercolor Paper 24 x 24 cm / 9.4 x 9.4 in

“There is no shortcut”

I have heard this several times in the last couple of months and for now it is my first motto. There are others but this one is the first one, reminding me that I have to practise again and again every skill I want to learn, and excel in.

Another motto could be “if you teach you learn”. Which is a very interesting approach brought to me by Coach Sean d’Souza (you find the link to his blog in the sidebar).

So I would like to teach you what I learned yesterday. Above you see the colorstudy for a new painting. I proceed like that:  I choose a photograph I made of a favourite subject. It is very important to me that it is I who made the picture. This will give the painting the unique touch. Then I open photoshop and work on a composition, which in this case is square because I chose a square Hahnemühle Quattro Watercolor, 40 x 40 cm (15.7 x 15.7 in).

I also change the contrast and the luminosity a little, which gives certain elements more importance and make the scene more dramatical.

I lay down (draw) a grid on my paper, as I have to transfer the format into a bigger one. Then I draw the basic lines and shapes into this grid.

Next comes the colorstudy. This time I really take my time cause I want the colors as I imagine them, see them on the photograph, on the screen. For the colorstudy I take the same paper as for the painting. I chose tubes of colors which I think will be necessary for this composition. Here I just rely on instinct. You grab what you think you need. I have to explain that I work with an extended pallette here, but you can get all of those tones with a reduced pallette too. You’d need for example Cobalt Blue, French Ultramarine, Alizarin Crimson, lemon yellow, Vermillion, Emerald Green. With those six colors, you really can do anything you want, but you have to premix quite a quantity of each color, or just accept that your hues will change while working.

THE WALL IN THE BACKGROUND

For the special hue of the wall in the background which is like rosy sand, roasted in some spots, I’ll test the following:

1. Bitumen (I guess you could take burnt umber too) – Sennelier
2. Rouge de Venise – Sennelier (reddish brick brown)
3. Marron de Perylène – Windsor & Newton (chestnut redbrown)
4. Prussian Blue – Daler & Rowney
5. Vert de Vessie – Sennelier
6. Lemon Yellow – Windsor and Newton
7. Terre de Pozzaoli – Schmincke (red sandstone)
8. Rose Tyrien – Linel - just a tiny drop ….(we’ll come back to this one, it’s terrific!!!)
9. Ultramarine Violet – Blockx - almost forgot this one, although it makes the perfect shadow on the lower part of the wall! This one is a “premixed” color, it has a lot of transparency. You could get the same with French Ultramarine and a little bit of Alizarin Crimson.

THE WATER IN THE FOREGROUND

I will need a very calm seagreen, something light which I’ll darken down with a dark red in the shadowy areas:

1. Bleu de Prusse – Daler & Rowney
2. Emerald Green – Blockx
3. Terre de Pozzaoli – Schmincke (will make the shadow on the green)

THE HEART

Well well well. The heart. Now you must get curious. I just hope I’ll have this painting finished by Valentines day,

Here we need a juicy red, sparkling with white and bright pink light reflections !

1. Kraplack rosa – Blockx - it is a soft and rather transparent pink, which has a tendency of building pigment puddles at exactly the spot, where your brush was last)
2. Scharlach – Schmincke – This one is so intense and dynamic, it almost jumps out of the tube right into your face:) It is so dense, you only need a tiny bit to make a big red mess. So yes, this is just what I need for my big heart!
3. Alizarin Crimson – Daler @ Rowney – A color which I use a lot, I love this red, it is wise and discrete, you can make wonderful violets using it in combination with various blues. It darkens the Scharlach, but beware of stagnating pigment puddles too!
4. Bitumen – Sennelier – again my beloved Bitumen, it’s nice to put a shadow on bright pink and red.
5. Rose Tyrien – Linel - WOW ! I would like to name it Rose Tyranny, because it just wipes out every other color beside it, if you don’t use it absolute caution. You can see how it dominates here in my colorstudy. This is a TORNADOPINK

OK, LAST NOT LEAST THE METAL, BLACK METAL

1. Gris de Payne – Sennelier - gives you a wonderful range of greys and blacks. If I want an object really jump to the foreground, I put on successive layers of dark grey, either Payne Grey or a mixture of prussian blue, emerald green (not Blockx emerald green which is too transparent, but Daler & Rowney) and bitumen or burnt umber. I have to let the layers dry completely, before putting on the next one.

VOILA - That is it. Now you’ll have to wait until I show you the painting in order to see what I did with those colors.

I would love if my post inspires to pull out your watercolors from a drawer or cupboard and play. Have  fun and a wonderful week.